The ever helpful Terry would like to sign up your own manufacturing/retail business, your child’s school, the medical clinic you attend, the local council and government agencies in your area, and sundry other businesses as ERM customers if you live in New South Wales.

Because ERM Power is well aware that communities right across the NSW Northern Rivers are not happy with that mining company’s plan to turn parts of our unique environment and valued agricultural land into gasfields, which will reduce the region’s groundwater resources and possibly irreversibly contaminate aquifers and water bores near or within those same gasfields and/or pollute surface water courses.

ERM is not just aware because its directors and staff read the newspaper or watch the nightly news, no ERM is aware because it is now the largest shareholder in Metgasco Limited, as ERM Power Limited, Energy Resource Managers Pty Ltd and Trevor St. Baker.

By virtue of its share acquisitions over a number of years ERM Power and Messrs. Tony Bellas (Chairman, Non Exec. Director), Philip St Baker (Managing Director, CEO),Martin Greenberg (Non Exec. Director),Brett Heading (Non Exec. Director),Antonio (Tony) Mario Iannello (Non Exec. Director),Trevor St Baker (Non Exec. Director) and Peter Jans (General Counsel) would have considerable influence on any future decisions Megasco may make with regard to coal seam gas exploration and commercial production on the NSW North Coast.It is probably no coincidence that in the days that ERM finally became Metgasco's largest shareholder, Metgasco announced that it was not capping and abandoning all its wells on the NSW North Coast and was keeping open the possibility of starting coal seam gas production approximately 10 kms west north west of Casino.

In July 2012 ERM Power told the Australian Stock Exchange that its strategy is to gain a foothold in the east coast gas market, consider conventional/coal seam gas production as well as generation opportunities and achieve the same success it achieved in West Australia.(1)These are photographs of ERM Power-Empire Oil & Gas-Wharf Resourcesjoint venture gasfield sites in the coastal Perth Basin, West Australia:

So if an ERM Business Energy representative makes contact with you – please take time to consider what you value about your regional lifestyle and whether ERM, through its interest in Metgasco, may be intent on ruining that lifestyle for you, your family, your friends and neighbours, purely for its own commercial gain.

MIDDLE-CLASS
welfare has become a term of abuse, at least to people who read The
Australian's editorials. A recent one castigated the Rudd Government for
forgetting what it described as "the war cries of Opposition about ridding
Australia of the middle-class welfare of the Howard era". Almost by
definition, anything described as middle-class welfare is redundant and should
be eliminated. The trouble with such tagging, though, is that benefits that
seem superfluous to The Australian look quite different to recipients on modest
incomes with few choices. As well, many government payments support social
goals such as higher female participation in the workforce or fertility rates.
Although paid through Centrelink, these are better described as universal
entitlements than welfare.”

Saturday, 27 April 2013

At a press conference he called himself at the Adelaide Ice Service factory on 26 April 2013, Opposition Leader Tony Abbott abruptly walked away when asked a question concerning his contradictory stance on the Good and Services Tax (GST).

Re-writing the ‘official’ record the Liberal Party published transcript has Abbott closing the question segment with a Thank you and not the sight of his retreating back.

This is a classic case of misdirection in the hope that local media and interested Northern Rivers’ residents would not notice recent share sales.

On 22 April Metgasco also lost CSG Nominees Pty Ltd (a wholly-owned subsidiary of Liquid Natural Gas Group Limited) as its largest shareholder, whenthese companies divested themselves of 24,310,732 of the 34,570,577 shares held at 21 September 2012.

It is unclear as to whether CSG Nominees intends to sell any remaining shares.

Chinese-owned Anchor ResourcesLimited has lodged a further mining exploration application ELA 4731 which will extends its proposed gold/antimony mining projects further into the Nymboida River sub-catchment of the larger Clarence River Catchment.

The Clarence Valley and Coffs Harbour local government areas primarily draw the drinking water for an estimated 120,000 peoplefrom the Nymboida Riversystem.

This was Opposition Leader Tony Abbott during an ABC 7.30 interview on 24 April 2013:

Well, that's not a correct figure. Yes, we do have to find significant savings, but it's nothing like that figure. Nothing like that figure at all. And let's look, if I may for a moment take you across the Tasman to New Zealand. The New Zealand National Government is on track to get total government spending down from 35 to just 30 per cent of GDP without savage cuts by two things. First, they've made changes that have promoted economic growth, and second, they have religiously guarded against additional new spending. And that's where this government has gone so wrong. Every day we have ministers talking about difficulties with the revenue and every day the Prime Minister is out there announcing billions in new spending.

If one looks at 2013 March Quarter data found at the New Zealand Treasury website then it is obvious that Australia still compares favourably with New Zealand across a number of the eight graphs shown below.Australia has higher real GDP growth, lower government debt as a percentage of GDP, smaller current account deficit, a lower unemployment rate and a higher gross national income level.

New Zealand only

New Zealand only

WhileThe World Bank allows this comparison of Gross National Income based on purchasing power parity:

Tuesday, 23 April 2013

The Australian and New South Wales Governments have today reached an historic agreement which will benefit over 1.1 million students across the state.

The Prime Minister and Premier of NSW today signed the National Education Reform Agreement, kicking off the biggest change to school education in Australia for 40 years.

It’s an agreement that will drive long term improvements in NSW schools and a fairer approach to funding based on the needs of every student.

Building on recent Federal and NSW reform directions, the agreement incorporates the National Plan for School Improvement. This will see the two governments work together to achieve:

Stronger requirements for entry to teaching courses and better induction and support for new teachers;

Higher teaching standards and annual teacher performance appraisals;

The Australian Curriculum from Foundation to Year 12 in full;

Publicly available school improvement plans and reports;

Empowered school leadership through greater local authority in staff selection and roles;

School readiness assessments for students on entry to school;

A priority focus on reading instruction for students in kindergarten to Year 2; and

Greater provision of Asian languages across all year levels.

Both Governments will adopt consistent needs-based funding arrangements, with the Federal Government moving to legislate its funding commitments over coming weeks.

This will provide NSW schools with additional investment totalling around $5 billion over six years. Of this, the Federal Government will contribute 65 per cent ($3,270 billion) and the NSW Government 35 per cent ($1,761 billion).

On top of this, the Federal Government has committed to grow its school education spending by 4.7 per cent per year from 2014 into 2015 and throughout the agreement. In return, NSW has agreed to grow its own school budget by 3 per cent per year from 2016 onwards.

Both Governments have agreed a year-by-year transition that will see funding for NSW schools reach at least 95 per cent of the new Schooling Resource Standard in 2019 in a fair and consistent way.

The NSW Government runs the largest school system in the country. Today’s announcement confirms that the National Plan for School Improvement, including new funding arrangements, can and should apply to all Australian students.

This agreement between the Federal and NSW Governments sets the benchmark for other states and will drive the reforms we need to see if Australia is to be in the top five in the world in reading, maths and science by 2025.

The Australian Government is determined to keep working closely with all remaining state and territories– and with schools, parents and communities right across the nation – to see these reforms agreed by 30 June 2013.

This will give schools the certainty they need to plan for next year.

These reforms are in the interests of all Australian children, and they are in our national interest so we can take economic advantage of the opportunities of the Asian century.

Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.
[Adopted and proclaimed by United Nations General Assembly resolution 217 A (III) of 10 December 1948]

NSW North Coast

Australian Bureau of Meteorology

Moggy Musings

Hi! My name is Boy. I'm a male bi-coloured tabby cat. Ever since I discovered that Malcolm Turnbull's dogs were allowed to blog, I have been pestering Clarencegirl to allow me a small space on North Coast Voices.

An investigative musing: Newcastle Herald, 12 August 2017: The state’s corruption watchdog has been asked to investigate the finances of the Awabakal Aboriginal Local Land Council, less than 12 months after the troubled organisation was placed into administration by the state government. The Newcastle Herald understands accounting firm PKF Lawler made the decision to refer the land council to the Independent Commission Against Corruption after discovering a number of irregularities during an audit of its financial statements.The results of the audit were recently presented to a meeting of Awabakal members. Administrator Terry Lawler did not respond when contacted by the Herald and a PKF Lawler spokesperson said it was unable to comment on the matter. Given the intricate web of company relationships that existed with at least one former board member it is not outside the realms of possibility that, if ICAC accepts this referral, then United Land Councils Limited (registered New Zealand) and United First Peoples Syndications Pty Ltd(registered Australia) might be interviewed. North Coast Voicesreaders will remember that on 15 August 2015 representatives of these two companied gave evidence before NSW Legislative Council General Purpose Standing Committee No. 6 INQUIRY INTO CROWN LAND. This evidence included advocating for a Yamba mega port.

A Nationals musing: Word around the traps is that NSW Nats MP for Clarence Chris Gulaptis has been talking up the notion of cruise ships visiting the Clarence River estuary. Fair dinkum! That man can be guaranteed to run with any bad idea put to him. I'm sure one or more cruise ships moored in the main navigation channel on a regular basis for one, two or three days is something other regular river users will really welcome. *pause for appreciation of irony* The draft of the smallest of the smaller criuse vessels is 3 metres and it would only stay safely afloat in that channel. Even the Yamba-Iluka ferry has been known to get momentarily stuck in silt/sand from time to time in Yamba Bay and even a very small cruise ship wouldn't be able to safely enter and exit Iluka Bay. You can bet your bottom dollar operators of cruise lines would soon be calling for dredging at the approach to the river mouth - and you know how well that goes down with the local residents.

A local councils musing: Which Northern Rivers council is on a low-key NSW Office of Local Government watch list courtesy of feet dragging by a past general manager?

A serial pest musing: I'm sure the Clarence Valley was thrilled to find that a well-known fantasist is active once again in the wee small hours of the morning treading a well-worn path of accusations involving police, local business owners and others.

An investigative musing: Which NSW North Coast council is batting to have the longest running code of conduct complaint investigation on record?

A which bank? musing: Despite a net profit last year of $9,227 million the Commonwealth Bank still insists on paying below Centrelink deeming rates interest on money held in Pensioner Security Accounts. One local wag says he’s waiting for the first bill from the bank charging him for the privilege of keeping his pension dollars at that bank.

A Daily Examiner musing: Just when you thought this newspaper could sink no lower under News Corp management, it continues to give column space to Andrew Bolt.

A thought to ponder musing: In case of bushfire or flood - do you have an emergency evacuation plan for the family pet?

An adoption musing: Every week on the NSW North Coast a number of cats and dogs find themselves without a home. If you want to do your bit and give one bundle of joy a new family, contact Happy Paws on 0419 404 766 or your local council pound.